


don't you love the part right before the dawn?

by perbe



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Blood, Injury, M/M, Slow Burn, in which kenji should really watch his language
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-25
Updated: 2015-12-25
Packaged: 2018-05-06 10:51:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,534
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5414087
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/perbe/pseuds/perbe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Five things that happened at training camp, or maybe they didn't--not in chronological order. </p><p>(Otherwise known as the one where Futakuchi Kenji spikes a ball right into Ushiwaka's face.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	don't you love the part right before the dawn?

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Metis_Ink](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Metis_Ink/gifts).



> for metis_ink. 
> 
> the song at the beginning is "silver moons" by sunset rubdown. but i would recommend listening to photograph by ed sheeran. because its been stuck in my head, ahaha, and also because. yeah, i think it fits.

gone are the days bonfires make me think of you

looks like the prophecy came true

you are a fallen tree, he is a fallen tree

how old are you, no, how old are you?

 

\--

 

**didn’t you love the part right before the dawn?**

\--

\--

(v.)

 

There is something grossly fascinating about the sound of his own nose breaking, Wakatoshi thinks—like it’s happening to someone else.

 

It’s an absurd thought. In fact, he’s had ample time to prepare. For days now, Futakuchi has been trying to get past Shiratorizawa’s blocks. And though Wakatoshi is no Satori or Taichi, he’s tall enough and just fast enough that his presence at the net is unmistakable. That sort of pressure would get to anyone, let alone the ace of Dateko on the last day of training camp. The little black tab on the score flips over—17:11 to Dateko. A block-out, on Wakatoshi’s nose. Said boy reaches up to prod at the skin. It’s not broken. It’s just… slightly compromised.

 

Futakuchi is eying his hands—callused and tinged pink from the spikes and blocks.

 

The whistle blows as Wakatoshi is still trying to figure out his nose and the blood trickling through his fingers.

 

“Everyone off the court!” Oiwake says. He starts toward the court. “Holy—“

 

And then Washijou takes over, as he usually does. “Satori! Get a mop. You! Number 7! Go with him.”

 

Amidst all the confusion and commotion, Futakuchi is statue-still. Wakatoshi takes the clean towel that’s shoved into his hands and presses it against his nose. Then, he stands next to Futakuchi who takes one look at him and says, “Oh holy shit, oh holy fucking shit, what the god damn hell,” and in a way, that’s as good of a start as any.

 

\--

\--

 

(iv.)

Whether it is cool, balmy, or stifling, Futakuchi likes to open the windows. He makes a study out of running his hands along the walls until they come to some pane of glass. Then he nudges the window open with the air of one pulling a prank. In the mornings, he curls up by the curtains like an overgrown cat. This is what Wakatoshi notices in their mornings together; neither of them sleep well when they can feel the heat creeping up from the earth into the floor and into their futons, and somehow the habit to wake early has been ingrained in him; to sit with Futakuchi waiting for the tea to chill, the air between them sleepy with the sort of drowsiness only summer can inspire. In those moments, everything seems a little bit closer than it is.  

 

Today, it is raining. Wakatoshi crosses over to sample the water with his wrist. It’s cold. He wants to walk outside and sit there for an hour. They’ll do road drills soon, but that’s a different thing altogether.

 

“It feels nice,” Futakuchi says. He’s trailed his blankets after him again. Even now, he’s half-in-half-out of them. One of his legs rests against the mosquito screen. “It’s been _moist_ for a while.”

 

Wakatoshi takes a seat on the table and brings his mug to his nose. The steam is full and strong. He takes a sip, sets the mug back on the table, and sighs.

 

Futakuchi rolls his eyes. His own mug sits on the windowsill with him in the same state of precarious existence. “You really are impatient, yeah? You burned your tongue just now, didn’t you?”

 

And closer yet.

 

“Hm.”

 

A snort and a shaking of the shoulders. Stillness everywhere else. “Be more careful next time, stupid.”

 

Here are the things Wakatoshi notices on these mornings. The early hour or maybe the grey-gold of near-dawn lends what’s said undue gravity. Light is more thin, then. As he lies back against the table, his feet dangling onto a chair, he turns toward Futakuchi and considers asking for a blanket. But the sunlight has a transformative quality and it silhouettes everything just so—

 

and his thoughts fade like raindrops on concrete, like shadows or memories.

 

\--

\--

 

(iii.)

 

On weekend nights, they grip flashlights with their teeth as they wheel the projector out of the supply closet. They set it up to face the smooth surface of the plywood bathroom—supposedly more a joke than anything.

 

All of it seems more silly when Date Tech High is here with them. Maybe it’s because it is the first day. The coaches talk together in whispers. The players do a mock-up of mingling, half on their best behavior and half at a loss for words.

 

“The sound quality is bad,” Satori whines, shining his flashlight under his chin. He wiggles his fingers at Eita, who just misses kicking him in the shins. “And they wouldn’t let me play House.”

 

They’ve settled into the grass by now. The dew sticks to Wakatoshi’s legs; he hasn’t bothered unfolding his sleeping bag. He leans back against the roll and watches the credits flicker to life against the bricks. Reon lies down beside him and they can both share the makeshift pillow and the occasional skeptical glance toward the subtitles. The cacophony of crickets, cicadas, and the dramatic soundtrack is overwhelming. It’s a low brassy song interspersed with a racing beat that thrums against the earth so that its echoes can be heard if you put your ear to the dirt.

 

“Take your trashy horror movies and watch them at home,” Eita says. His voice is soft and sleepy. “Jaws is a classic.”

 

“I think House is a classic,” Satori says. “It was in 1977. And it’s _good_. But I guess you’re more into the trashy thriller genre, huh? That suits—“  

 

“Shut _up_ ,” Reon says in the tone that suggests he would to use certain stronger words. “I’m trying to sleep.”  

 

“Then sleep.”

 

Satori rolls himself toward Wakatoshi. The expression on his face says he’s about to puzzle something out—or maybe he already has because when he speaks, it’s with a certain matter-of-factness. “You should be nicer to me, Wakatoshi-kun. We’re not even going to be on the same team after this year.” He pokes Wakatoshi in the ribs, just lightly enough to tickle and just strongly enough to sting. “You’re going to miss us.”

 

“Shut up,” Reon says again. He has his arm thrown over his eyes but Wakatoshi knows he’s been listening in.

 

At last, Eita says, “You sure know how to ruin the mood.”

 

“I wasn’t trying to.”

 

“You—“

 

“We don’t have to be on different terms.”

 

Eita laughs. “Not everyone breathes volleyball.”

 

Reon is watching them. His mouth is half-open like he wants to say something. Wakatoshi doesn’t know when they’ve all sat up. The details are important. Somehow, he’s been missing something for years; that Eita, Reon, and Satori are not exactly who he thinks they are. Behind them, the shark leaps from the water, its teeth on wide display. The subtitles are barely legible—Hayato’s gesticulating to Yunohama, whose head is caught in the projection. “What does that mean?”

 

Eita follows his line of sight, snorts, and turns back to face them all. “It just needs to be said. Not everyone here is going to play professionally. We’re not all going to be scouted.”

 

“But we’re still on the same team right now,” Reon says quickly. “We’ll stay on for Spring High if we have to. But… if we win Nationals after Inter-High, I’ll quit to study. I can’t rely on getting a sports scholarship.”

 

“Yeah, yeah!” Satori sprawls himself across their laps. “We’re gonna do it this year! I mean, I’d stay on for Spring High anyway. I wanna crush—“

 

“Alright, alright.” Reon shoves his hand over Satori’s mouth. “Are you okay, Wakatoshi?”

 

 _It will stay the same_ is what they’re trying to tell him, Wakatoshi thinks. “But you won’t continue volleyball in college.”

 

“College is pretty far away,” Reon says.

 

“Especially for Eita,” Satori chimes in. “What is he? In the bottom class, failing English, failing—“

 

“He’s asleep.” Eita pinches Satori’s side before claiming his stomach as a pillow. “If you’re just going to be an asshole, watch the movie instead.”

 

“Okay,” Wakatoshi says. The syllables fade into the blaring soundtrack of the movie, and the response, if any, is lost to the summer night.

 

\--

\--

 

(ii.)

 

In second year, Wakatoshi can feel himself sliding back. It’s been going on for years, he thinks. There’s nowhere to go in high school—not after winning the Nationals in the last year of middle school—not anything that isn’t maintaining the title of number one. But in first year, Eita shatters his elbow and they lose to Itachiyama for the first time. And in second year, they blaze through Regionals like it’s nothing. At Inter-High, they face Dateko in octo-finals and Aoba Jousai in finals. There are no whispers of who will win Regionals. By now it’s a given.

 

At Nationals, Shiratorizawa loses in the quarter-finals by the smallest of margins. It’s Kiryuu’s school, Shishigaku. It’s expected. But a loss is a loss no matter what the score is, and they make it ten miles down the road to Sendai before Washijou makes the bus driver pull up beside them and shouts, “Get in.”

 

No one mentions the tears in his eyes. Then again, these days, there are too many things they can’t talk about at all.

 

\--

\--

 

(vi.)

 

“You look weird. Like something out of a B-grade horror,” Futakuchi says. He’s determinedly looking out the window and his feet keep tapping against the floor. Wakatoshi wonders if he’s nervous. “Sorry.”

 

“Is there still blood on my face?” It should’ve all been scrubbed off. He was right, earlier. His nose isn’t broken, but his uniform is ruined and he had to hold an ice-pack to his face for an hour.

 

“No. I didn’t mean that.”  

 

It’s stopped raining. Futakuchi has his hand dangling out the window anyway. Wakatoshi thinks about telling him he’ll fall like that, or reassuring him that his nose is fine for the tenth time today. But their teammates are all asleep and if he doesn’t ask now, he never will. Besides, he has the strangest feeling they’re thinking about the same thing. “Then why did you say it?”

 

“Don’t know,” Futakuchi says.

 

“You always do that.”

 

“Do what?”

 

Not just Futakuchi. Everyone else, too. “Wouldn’t it be better if you said it directly?”

 

“You aren’t, either. So don’t lecture me, Ushiwaka.”

 

A pause. It is a phenomenon of sorts, this mass inability to tell the truth. Maybe he should stop looking for an explanation. Yet. “Don’t call me that.”

 

Futakuchi looks at him now. “What do you really want to say? If you’re angry I accidentally spiked a ball into your face, well, you should’ve blocked with your arms like everyone else does. I already apologized. Are we over this now? Can’t you just. I don’t know. Can’t you just stop with your stupid fucking condescension for once?” He must be aware of how sharp his voice sounds because he shrinks into his windowsill. The way the light clings to him makes him look years older (or younger). “What the hell, Ushijima. It’s like you’re a magnet of stress, alright? I don’t know even know what the fuck I’m telling you right now.”

 

For lack of better words: “I don’t condescend.”

 

“Of course that’s what you pick up on.” His sheets, Wakatoshi notices, are all knotted up. It’s a good thing they’re leaving in a few hours. “You don’t get it, do you? You say next to nothing about what you’re actually thinking. You just pick at other people. You just say your stupid—your fucking—things, you tell them they’re doing well, or you tell them they need to improve. What’s that first year that always bugs you? Goshiki? How the fuck do you think he feels, huh?”

 

So that’s what this is.

 

(That’s what it always is.)

 

“It was a good spike,” Wakatoshi says. He takes a sip of his tea. It’s gone cold. “I don’t regret telling you that.”

 

Futakuchi balls up his sheets and unceremoniously dumps them on Wakatoshi’s face. The tea goes everywhere: on the floor, on Wakatoshi, on Futakuchi.

 

“You should clean that up,” Wakatoshi tells him. “The others will be awake soon.”

 

“No, we’ll settle this first. You need to get it. That spike—“ Futakuchi peels the wet sheets off his arm in disgust. “It’s not good enough to beat Shiratorizawa.”

 

His head hurts. “I know that.”

 

“Then why did you tell me it was good? Are you trying to get our hopes up or something? You know, I was sitting on the sidelines in your second year, and Aone—and this is the third-years’ final chance, alright? And you don’t even care. You don’t even care that you win because it’s so fucking obvious you will. Don’t you think about how that feels? To lose to someone who doesn’t even see you as a threat?” Futakuchi is flushed red. There’s a deep breathless quality in his voice and his shoulders are shaking.

 

It’s too warm for him to be cold. The alternative is frightening.

 

“To practice. To practice and not see the results of that practice. To push yourself so hard for nothing. What’s that supposed to do? What kind of an ace does that make me?”

 

Futakuchi swipes at his eyes. He almost trips on the sheets in his search of a napkin. As he’s blowing his nose into around five paper towels, Wakatoshi folds the sheets. He lines them up corner to corner and places the pile at the center of the table. It’s all fitting together, now.

 

“You’re better than you were when I met you,” Wakatoshi says slowly.

 

“That was tens and under volleyball,” Futakuchi snaps back, but there’s no bite in his words. Possibly because his face is still covered up with tissues. “And you moved up to intermediate in what, two weeks? And I just moved to a different city.”

 

There are people you have to leave behind in life. There are people who can’t move forward with you. Perhaps Eita won’t get scouted, and perhaps Reon will quit the team with him. Whether Wakatoshi wants them to continue like this or not (and he does) may make no difference in the long term. But he doesn’t have to miss them yet, so he won’t.

 

As for Futakuchi… “Then you can’t say you didn’t improve.”

 

“That’s not the point.”

 

“Only if all volleyball is to you is winning.”

 

“It’s not.”

 

“Then do you have fun playing?”

 

Futakuchi stares. “What kind of a dumb question is that? Of course I do.”

 

Wakatoshi blinks. Was it? It seemed like a safer option than assuming more than he should. That was how this argument had begun in the first place. “Does losing take the fun out of it?”

 

A laugh; short and weak but sincere. Futakuchi grabs the sheets off the table and mops up the rest of the tea on the floor. On the way, he catches an ant from between the floorboards and holds it up for closer inspection. It must have passed the test, because he places it on a clean paper towel and says, “I’m going to take it outside.”

 

On a wild impulse, Wakatoshi catches him by the hand. “You didn’t answer the question.”

 

“You’re oversimplifying it,” Futakuchi says. But he stays where he is and that’s more telling than anything.

 

Because he wants to hear it: “Did it help?”

 

“You’re savage in the mornings,” Futakuchi tells him. He extracts his wrist from Wakatoshi’s grip and puts the ant on the aloe vera plant in the corner. “But I guess, a little. It doesn’t fix everything, though.”

 

With growing certainty, “No. You have to fix the rest yourself.”   

 

That’s when it goes from dawn to day. The mourning dove stops cooing and he can hear his teammates stirring—Satori and Tsutomu are enthusiastic, even in the morning. Futakuchi’s eyes are a bright near-amber. When he laughs again, the sun catches on his eyelashes. “You’re too honest. One day, someone is actually going to fight you.”

 

“Like you did,” Wakatoshi says, smiling.

 

“I’ll spike another ball into your face,” Futakuchi answers. He backs away a little to give them both space to sit on the floor. They are both a bit pink and overwarm. It will be good to have some rest before Hayato starts up the annual game of suikawari. “Don’t doubt me.”

 

Wakatoshi says, “I won’t.”

 

\--

\--

 

(i.)

 

The first thing Futakuchi ever said to him was, “Your ears look like the cabbages.” They met because their parents took them to the same youth volleyball club, and Wakatoshi was already ahead of the class. It was partially because his dad had taught him things like serving and receiving and partially because he was strong for his age.

 

“Cabbages can’t hear,” Wakatoshi said.

 

But Futakuchi had been a setter before he was ever a wing spiker and somehow they ended up as practice partners. The teacher lowered the net so that they could practice spiking and serving. As soon as he turned around, Futakuchi would sneak over and raise the net up, bit by bit, to its original height. Maybe that’s why Wakatoshi remembers him. Futakuchi is impatient and has a terrible temper, but he’s ambitious. In the end, they did manage to get a spike over the net.

 

It must mean something.

 

(Life is a practice in letting go, at times. The options are to let go, or to become an architect. To build anew wherever you go.)

 

It must.

 

\--

\--

 

(vii.)

 

Tsutomu likes to quadruple check their rooms. He turns up with a stray phone charger (Taichi’s) and a cowboy hat (shamefully, also Taichi’s). The last item is a phone strap—a bear.

 

“I’ll take it,” Wakatoshi says.

 

Tsutomu starts. “Eh? It’s yours? That’s cute, Ushijima-senpai. Should I get one like that too?”

 

Hayato nearly chokes on his own laughter.

 

Satori beams. “You know what you should get instead? You should get a—“

 

“Come on, Tsutomu,” Reon says, herding them all toward the bus. “Wakatoshi, get back here in five minutes or Tanji-kun will leave without you.”

 

Wakatoshi nods once, and heads off to the Dateko bus. He turns the bear over in his fingers. It looks a bit like the middle blocker—like Aone. He walks faster. A flush is rising up the back of his neck and he’s not sure how to stop it, or if he wants to stop it at all. Still, he lingers by the door of Dateko’s bus (hired, he notices; it’s not really the club’s) before stepping in. Immediately, a hush falls over the boys. Conversation resumes after he shoots them all a questioning look, but he can almost feel fifteen sets of eyes on his back as he edges toward Futakuchi.

 

“Uh, hi,” Futakuchi says. He’s sitting next to Aone and there is something of the early-morning peace in his easy smile. “This might be a bad time, but what’s up?”

 

Wakatoshi resists the urge to scratch his neck and negotiates a compromise with timidity by flushing as red as Satori’s hair. He opens his hand. “This is yours.”

 

“Oh! Oh, frick, yeah I was looking for that. I thought it was in my bookbag,” Futakuchi says, hooking his pinkie through the string and twirling it around in a way that’s just a bit worrisome. Then, he glances up and goes a dark shade of plum. “Um, thanks. It’s a gift from Aone, you know? This is Aone. I don’t know if you’ve talked.”

 

“We haven’t,” Wakatoshi says.

 

“Oh.”

 

Aone stares at them both.

 

“Hey Ushiwaka, when you get back to your bus, tell that asshole Tendou I’m gonna fight him!” yells Kamasaki. “Tell him to come find me in the pit at 4:00 pm.”

 

“Ah!” That’s Moniwa. “Don’t mind him, please. He’s overexcited. He should go to sleep soon.”

 

Wakatoshi is about to say he doesn’t mind when he realizes he’s stalling. So he turns to Futakuchi instead, and says, “I’m glad we met again.”

 

He counts five shades of surprised and an unreadable emotion flickering across Futakuchi’s face before the latter says, “Geez. That’s really gay,” and proceeds to eye Aone as if he’s considering using him as a human shield. “Ushijima, that’s. That’s embarrassing, I have _chills_. I can’t deal with you. Why are you like this?”

 

Another look around the bus tells him that the whole team is listening in, staging their conversations so that Wakatoshi lets down his guard. He knows for sure that Aone is watching them in a way that can almost be called curious. But none of that matters so much as _this_. Not when he has three minutes before Washijou tells the driver to leave without him. It’s happened to Yunohama before, and it can happen again. He braces himself.

 

(It’s not just morning; maybe Futakuchi looks—well—any time of the day.)

 

“That’s not gay,” he says, leaning in with his heart in his throat. “This is.” And he closes the distance between them. Like a resolution, or a solution. A beginning.

 

For a moment, they’re frozen. There’s tittering from all around them.

 

“Yeah,” Futakuchi mumbles against his lips. “Yeah, it is.”

**Author's Note:**

> happy holidays, metis_ink! golly gee okay so i looked into your profile and stuff right? right after ig ot the assignment and i realized that you are /the/ ushifuta person and i look up to your writing so much and its such a cool simple style thats poetic, catchy, and so, so poignant at times it makes me wanna cry. 
> 
> but here you go, i hope you like this. i couldnt find a way to worm koganegawa in, but. slow burn?? hopefully makes up for my rambling and all. 
> 
> xoxo,  
> eagle one  
> (i thought about it long and hard, and i think this is the name that best represents me)


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